TROUBLEMAKER DEALT WITH

WASHINGTON — More than a year before Colgan Air crashed a twin-engine turboprop on approach to Buffalo, Christopher J. Monteleon told his superiors at the Federal Aviation Administration that the airline was going to have trouble flying that model. ...

Three times, he said, the pilots flew the airplane faster than the manufacturer’s specifications allowed, but they initially refused to report this and have the plane inspected for damage. They flew with a broken radio and did not want to write that up in the maintenance log, as the rules require, he said, because it might delay the next test flight. And they tried three approaches to the airport in Charleston, W. Va., and “botched” all of them, failing to get the plane at an appropriate altitude, on the right path and at the right speed for landing.

...

But when he reported problems to his F.A.A. superiors, he was suspended from important portions of his job overseeing Colgan’s acquisition of the Dash 8 and given a desk job, he said.

nyt